U.S. Army Recognizes Humanism as a Religion In an Important Move For Religious Tolerance

If you happen to be a humanist in the United States Army, today is your lucky day. The Army will now allow soldiers to put down "humanist" as their official religious affiliation. For many, the move has been a long time coming and is being praised by people who say the army is too dominated by Christian culture.

There is no word yet on whether or not the other branches of the military will follow suit and begin officially recognizing humanism as a religion — or whether or not the Department of Defense will put a humanist organization on its list of groups that can officially sponsor chaplains. But for humanist soldiers, including Army Maj. Ray Bradley who first put in a request to be listed as a humanist two years ago, this move is a definite victory.

“I’m able to self-identity the belief system that governs my life, and I’ve never been able to do that before,” Bradley says.